Marko Vignjević
SHANGHAI COOPERATION ORGANIZATION - BALANCE IN THE GEOPOLITICS OF CENTRAL ASIA
Asia is a region of intensified interstate competition for influence and strategic dominance. The aim of this paper is to examine the balance in the geopolitics of Central Asia (CA) through the regional multilateral format of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). The examination begins with a description of CA geopolitics itself, taking into account all relevant factors - historical context, physical-geographical advantages, richness of energy resources and the general security situation. A special part of that is the question of the importance of CA in the foreign policy of regional and global powers (PRC, Russia, India and the USA) and their competition in this area known as the New Great Game. After that, the second part follows, in which some already present bilateral tensions are discussed, which can make the New Great Game more security sensitive, as well as the general context of the SCO. In this general context, the goals, principles and individual working bodies of the organization are presented as appropriate SCO mechanisms for establishing a balance in CA geopolitics. In the end, two important conclusions are drawn. The first is that the Asian interstate competition is most extensive in CA because this area is the focal point in the geostrategic ring made up of Russia, the People's Republic of China, India, Pakistan, Iran and Turkey (not neglecting the US external factor). The second conclusion is that the SCO, with institutional mechanisms for strengthening security and economic cooperation between member states, represents the most suitable and comprehensive model of balance in the complex geopolitics of CA.
CONTEMPORARY REAFFIRMATION OF MONROE DOCTRINE
US foreign policy is one of the most important topics in today's geopolitical discourse who take the multipolarisation of international relations as an indispensable starting point. Therefore, the subject research in this paper will be based on examining the possibility of contemporary reaffirmation of the Monroe Doctrine. The point is also to try to look further at US diplomacy and possibly assume its further course compared to the increased influence of Russia and the People's Republic of China in Central and South America today. The first part of the paper deals with the 19th century and the geo-strategic context of the American continent who determined the model of the Western Hemisphere (North, Central and South America) - the basis of the Monroe Doctrine. The idea of this model, as a unique sphere of interest of the USA, in the paper it is given importance and evaluation that it served as a principle in the geostrategic division of Europe after the Second World War. The second part of the paper presents the implementation of the Monroe Doctrine and the establishment of the Western Hemisphere through interventionist policies conducted by the United States in the 19th and 20th centuries. Examples of individual countries in Central and South America show interventionism based on a combination of US economic and military power, making the pattern recognizable in other parts of the world in the later post-Cold War period. The third part specifically reveals the today's presenceof Russia and the People's Republic of China in the Western Hemisphere, pointing to models of cooperation between these countries and Latin American countries. On the basis of all this, the conclusion is that the western hemisphere of the USA is again "threatened", that is, for the first time since the end of the Cold War, there is an increased influence of other countries in the region which the United States long ago declared its area of interest.
